Women made acclaimed films but have been shut out by the Directors Guild of America.

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Chloe Zhao’s “The Rider” just won the prestigious best picture honor from the National Society of Film Critics, but she and other women directors were shut out of nominations for a 2019 feature film award from the Directors Guild of America.

Filmmakers and journalists have reacted with anger to the news that the Directors Guild of America only nominated men for its 2019 feature film awards — one year after Hollywood seemed to make an effort to respond to #MeToo’s call to end gender inequality and sexual harassment by heaping nominations on one female director, Greta Gerwig.

For the guild’s feature film awards, the professional organization for movie and TV directors announced its nominees Tuesday. But all nine nominees are men, despite the fact that a number of women made acclaimed works in 2018 that have been nominated for other industry awards and have earned spots on many critics’ top 10 lists.

“It’s hard to believe (but I guess really not that hard) but not a single DGA nom in film is to a woman. NOT ONE SINGLE WOMAN,” tweeted Melissa Silverstein, founder of Women and Hollywood, which advocates for gender diversity and inclusion in the film industry.

“It’s depressing to see no female nominees in either of the DGA’s two narrative feature categories,” tweeted Guy Lodge, a freelance film critic for Variety and The Guardian. While he noted that three women were nominated in the documentary feature category, “you’d hope the best first feature category, in particular, would offer more balance.”

Director and film critic April Wolfe reacted to the DGA nominations by tweeting out a challenge to its members: “Do me a favor and watch at least one movie directed by a woman this week, and then maybe come back here and tell me what it was, thanks.”

I'm mad at the DGA (again) today. Do me a favor and watch at least one movie directed by a woman this week, and then maybe come back here and tell me what it was, thanks.

Indiewire’s Zack Sharf wrote the nominations are “frustrating” because of the number of female directors who should be serious contenders for DGA notice, as well as for Academy Award nominations. To Sharf and others, these women include Chloe Zhao (“The Rider”), Marielle Heller (“Can You Ever Forgive Me?), Debra Granik (“Leave No Trace”), Tamara Jenkins (“Private Life”) and Lynne Ramsay (“You Were Never Really Here”).

Granik was named best director by the Los Angeles Film Critics Association for “Leave No Trace,” which enjoys 100 percent on Rotten Tomatoes. She, Jenkins and Ramsay also are nominated for best director by the Independent Spirit Awards.

Zhao’s “The Rider,” with a 97 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes, just won the prestigious best picture honor from the National Society of Film Critics, whose members are writers from newspapers and other major U.S. media outlets. “The Rider” made more than 20 year-end top 10 lists.

For the National Society of Film critics, “The Rider” beat out “Roma,” directed by Alfonso Cuaron, who just won the best director prize at the Golden Globes and who is the Gold Derby website’s leading contender to win the Oscar this year. The Beijing-born Zhao joined Cuaron in being nominated for best director from the critics society.

“The Rider” previously won best picture from the Gotham Awards. It’s safe to say that “The Rider” wouldn’t exist without Zhao’s vision to transform the story of a real-life former professional rodeo rider into a poignant contemporary Western. It’s also safe to say that the other female directors brought similar, singular visions and talent to their films, certainly as much as any of the men honored by the Directors Guild (DGA) this year.

The DGA likes to tout its “decades” of pushing for greater diversity. In June 2018, it published a report which showed that diversity among feature film directors, “from the largest studio tent poles to the smallest indie films,” remained “low” in 2017. Directors have long been recognized as having a great deal of power over which stories get told in film and TV and who gets to work in front and behind the camera.

Actor Brady Jandreau and director Chloe Zhao attend a special screening of “The Rider” at the Writers Guild Theater on April 11, 2018 in Beverly Hills, California. (Photo by Amanda Edwards/Getty Images)

DGA President Thomas Schlamme slammed the lack of opportunity for women and people of color to direct films.

“It’s outrageous that we’re once again seeing such a lack of opportunity for women and people of color to direct feature films,” Schlamme said. “Our new study shows that discriminatory practices are still rampant across every corner of the feature film business. … From financing and hiring, to distribution and agent representation — every aspect of the entire system disadvantages women and people of color.”

While the DGA gave a nomination to Gerwig in 2018 for “Lady Bird” (she also was nominated for an Oscar), the guild’s list of nominees this year suggest that the “discriminatory practices” Schlamme condemned influenced the guild’s process for honoring the achievements of people in its profession.

Lenny Abrahamson, the director of 2015’s “Room,” also rebuked the DGA nominations, tweeting out his disappointment that Granik and Ramsay weren’t on its nominees’ list. Indeed, Abrahamson’s situation points out the reason the DGA nominations matter when it comes to Oscars consideration, Indiewire reported.

Abrahamson managed to secure an Oscar nomination for “Room,” despite the fact that he was snubbed for a DGA nomination that year. “To do so is rare,” Indiewire said.

Marielle Heller and Melissa McCarthy in conversation at the AFI FEST 2018 in November. (Photo by Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images for AFI)

Meanwhile, the all-male slate for DGA nominations this year follows a similar shut-out of women directors at the Golden Globe Awards, Indiewire added.

The men getting DGA nominations for feature film this year include some of the usual suspects of awards conversations.

It’s likely that critics would agree that many of these men, including Cuaron, deserve nominations. But critics also would say that not all of do, given the mixed critical reactions to their films. It also means that some deserving women got pushed aside.

There’s some consolation in the fact that three women were nominated in the documentary category: Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi (co-director, “Free Solo”) and the co-directors for “RBG”: Betsy West and Julie Cohen.

Director Julia Hart suggested that the DGA feature nominations show that the guild needs to work harder to bring in more members who are women and people of color. “Financiers and studios this starts with you,” she wrote in a tweet.

Indeed, only about 16 percent of DGA members are women, said writer Minhal Baig in a tweet. Hart also pointed out that the DGA didn’t nominate Ryan Coogler for “Black Panther,” suggesting that the tastes of “old white” men prevail in the organization.

The DGA nominations were announced the day before Time’s Up leaders had to address another way that the industry is still “broken,” according to the Hollywood Reporter. News came that Skydance Media had hired former Pixar and Disney Animation creative chief John Lasseter to be its new boss. Lasseter left Pixar and Disney Animation following multiple allegations of sexual harassment.”

Time’s Up said Lasseter’s hiring “endorses and perpetuates a broken system that allows powerful men to act without consequence.” Silverstein, of Woman and Hollywood, added that Lasseter’s return to power sends “a message to all that the bro culture is alive and well and thriving in Hollywood.”

Martha Ross is a features writer who covers everything and anything related to popular culture, society, health, women’s issues and families. A native of the East Bay and a graduate of Northwestern University and Mills College, she’s also a former hard-news and investigative reporter, covering crime and local politics.